The Great Silence

As with Django, Corbucci wrote the film with his brother Bruno, as well as Vittoriano Petrilli and Mario Amendola. He’d been deeply influenced by the recent assassinations of Che Guevara, Cuban revolutionary who had tried to spark a Communist overthrow of Bolivia, and the US’ Malcolm X, a one-time Nation of Islam leader converted to the Muslim faith and killed at a speaking engagement. As the end of the 60s approached, Corbucci felt that the era of progressive political action was dwindling, to be overtaken by fierce reactionary elements. The earlier activism seemed to him to be hurled backward in progress and time. As Alex Cox noted about Corbucci’s thoughts, “You could only take on the powerful and the wicked for a short while, it seemed, before they crushed you.” Corbucci set the film’s action in 1899 Utah just prior to the Great Blizzard, the winter scenes reflecting his feelings of pessimism, depression, and disgust. Another influence --- famed Italian actor Marcello Mastroianni had secretly wished to play a role in a Spaghetti but felt his poor English would interfere --- he suggested to Corbucci to pen a film of a mute protagonist. Corbucci adapted the idea into the film sans Marcello --- it would become the second Mud and Blood work, 1968’s The Great Silence, a word play on the bleakness of the winter setting and the mute anti-hero. 

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